Authored by Naveen Athrappully via The Epoch Times,
Crypto scammers are using couriers to pick up cash from victims in person to avoid being traced by banks, the FBI is warning.
The fraudsters first approach targets, typically seniors, with business or romantic proposals via social media, texts, or a fake cryptocurrency investment profile, the bureau said in a June 15 public service announcement alert.
“After establishing a relationship with the victim, the scammer suggests investing in cryptocurrency and instructs the victim to download specific cryptocurrency trading applications and create investment accounts.”
Typically, victims are asked to send wire transfers to various domestic and international bank accounts under the guise of deposit accounts.
They get access to websites showing fictitious returns on investment, which entices them to deposit even more money.
Legitimate financial institutions often flag such transfers as suspicious and block them. To bypass this, scammers are instructing victims to hand over money to fake investment accounts via in-person cash pickups.
The victims are led to believe the money they send will be deposited into their investment accounts.
“Once the cash pickup occurs and the courier departs, victims can see an increase in deposits in their virtual wallet displayed on their account with the scammer’s investment platform,” the FBI said.
“When the victim attempts to withdraw their perceived profits, scammers will begin the loop over by forcing the victim to pay fraudulent taxes and penalties, again using couriers for cash pickups to perpetrate the fraud.”
In 2024 the FBI issued an alert about couriers being used by scammers who had convinced their victims into liquidating their assets into cash or precious metals.
The fraudsters, posing as tech support or government officials, would insist such an action was necessary to protect the target’s funds because their financial accounts were hacked or at risk of being hacked.
In its latest alert, the FBI advised people to protect their personal information, such as banking details, and to never meet with unknown individuals to hand over cash or other valuables as part of any investment scheme.
“Beware of ‘love bombing,’ a social manipulation technique employed by online scammers and other malicious actors wherein a victim is quickly showered with praise, attention, and manipulated to feel trust and intimacy with a person prior to having their lowered guard exploited by a scam or other malicious behavior,” the agency said.
According to the FBI’s 2025 Internet Crime Report, published in April, the agency’s Internet Crime Complaint Center received 181,565 complaints regarding various cryptocurrency schemes last year, up 21 percent from 2024.
Losses from these complaints totaled over $11.36 billion. The average loss was $62,604, and 18,589 people lost more than $100,000 each.
The largest group of complaints filed were made by people over the age of 60. They also suffered the highest losses, totaling more than $4.43 billion.